


How He Thrills Me

by fishyspots



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Anal Sex, Canon Compliant, M/M, Pancakes, Pet Names, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Praise Kink, Service Top Patrick Brewer, The Mortifying Ordeal of Being Known
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-24
Updated: 2021-01-24
Packaged: 2021-03-15 22:22:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28945842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fishyspots/pseuds/fishyspots
Summary: The problem is how vehemently David hates pet names.It would be one thing if he was just ambivalent, or if his ire was confined to one or two names—the most egregious, maybe, like baby or sweetheart, or the truly tacky like lover or cutie. But he’s never really done things by halves.Or, David works through some big feelings.
Relationships: Patrick Brewer/David Rose
Comments: 29
Kudos: 279





	How He Thrills Me

**Author's Note:**

> HUGE thanks to SMAC (aka [Januarium](/users/Januarium/) and [schittposting](/users/schittposting/)) for the validation and support and, you know, friendship. Couldn't have done this without you!
> 
> Title is from "Honey, Honey" by ABBA. I will not be taking questions at this time.

The problem is how vehemently David hates pet names.

It would be one thing if he was just ambivalent, or if his ire was confined to one or two names—the most egregious, maybe, like baby or sweetheart, or the truly tacky like lover or cutie. But he’s never really done things by halves.

And of course it doesn’t help that he’s always been expressive. The first time Patrick floats a _babe_ —carefully sandwiched in between a tease and a declaration because he listens, and he sees, and he’s still sticking around—David can’t quite catch up with his mouth before it turns down. He can feel his lips pulling into a wince, okay? He’s not totally self-deluded despite what Stevie seems to think. He does know how he’s supposed to react in most social situations.

When Patrick sees the gross face he makes—yes, gross, he hates the way his neck pulls back and the stupid look he gets in his eyes—his boyfriend doesn’t start a conversation or apologize. Not out loud. Instead, he leans up and kisses David, which is almost worse. Patrick keeps reacting wrong to all the signs David puts up, just shifting gears and pressing a different advantage until David can’t remember what his initial sign even said. Or if there was a sign in the first place.

The calculating look in Patrick’s eye when he pulls back and sets David’s coffee order on the counter between them is worrisome, but not for the normal reasons. David sips the coffee distrustfully, licking his lips to get every last bit of the taste. The bitter coffee tempered by milk and undercut with the sweetness of the cocoa powder centers him like it always has.

Still, that look usually spells embarrassment in the long term for David, like when Patrick stuck a bunch of plungers everywhere and smiled like it was a gift when David berated him about it. And insulted his shoes, because David’s a mature person who’s great at adult relationship discussions.

Patrick keeps looking at him throughout the afternoon. When he rings up some wax melts that David talked Ray into leaving for real estate clients as a closing gift, he drops three of the little packages on the counter and one onto Ray’s foot because he’s so busy making the sunshine face that heats up the back of David’s neck. When David runs the Z report before Patrick finishes sweeping and turning the sign, he smiles an upside-down smile and blinks, which is somehow both endearing and incendiary.

Patrick holds the door of the store for him when they leave and then hooks a hand in the back pocket of David’s jeans when David turns for the motel, yanking him back toward his boyfriend and the clunker he still drives around in for fear of the denim’s integrity. “What are you doing tonight?”

“Um.” David would really quite prefer it if his boyfriend could stop flustering him. It’s very hard to stay put together and aloof when every push and pull works for him the way it does. “I was going to head home?”

“Come home to the apartment,” Patrick says.

David really needs to set up some boundaries here. Patrick wanted this place just for him, after all. He knows because he played those words—just for me just for me just for me—in a refrain for nearly a week before Patrick got the keys. Still, the privacy is enticing. And he’s not going to turn down time with Patrick over a technicality, especially one that he’d have to explain. Because then they’d talk about it. Probably, at least. Patrick isn’t any better at initiating these conversations than he is, but he hates to leave something unfinished and David doesn’t want to take any chances.

So he says, “Throw in dinner and it’s a date,” and carefully extricates Patrick’s hand before any irrevocable damage can be done to the jeans. They’re one of his favorite pairs, not least because of how Patrick reacts to them, always tugging David closer and running his hands along the material.

“I know you better than to not include dinner,” Patrick says, and it’s horrifying because it’s true. He does know better than that. He knows _David_ better than that. Worse, he hands over his phone with the maps app pulled up when they get in the car, letting David take the lead without question.

For his part, David taps in the Elmdale diner with the sticky menus. It’s close enough that they can still have an evening afterward but far enough that he won’t have to interact with a single Schitt (too hard to keep a straight face around Patrick) or his parents (too mortifying, as a rule). The smile on Patrick’s face as the mechanical voice calls out the turns is a lot for David, emotionally speaking, after the other looks he’s been getting all day.

Patrick reaches for his hand across the car’s center console and David submits to a squeeze. He allows himself to run a thumb along Patrick’s pointer finger, up to the callus on the tip and back down to the curve where it joins his thumb. Patrick’s skin is softer than it was before they started dating—one of David’s proudest accomplishments, and not just for the, ah, personal benefits Patrick’s smooth, touchable skin has granted him.

When David goes to pull away, Patrick holds tight for one, two more seconds, then squeezes again and releases him. Their dinner is uneventful, which is...fine. David asks Patrick if he’s going to get the pancakes, a totally normal question since Patrick always gets them with blueberries, hash browns, and a single over-easy egg. It’s a distinctive order; David can’t be blamed for the way it stuck in his head after the second time.

Patrick takes his interest in the order as an invitation to offer up bites of his pancakes at regular intervals, loading his fork and dipping it in the syrup that he asked for in a small cup on the side so it doesn’t contaminate his entire plate. Patrick likes when things stay in their place. And even though the sugary bites don’t really mesh with the flavor of his chicken caesar salad, the pleased nod Patrick does every time David eats off of his fork is worth the affront to his palate.

David files away that firm nod and the smile that Patrick hides behind his own bites. There’s something there worth exploring.

When they’ve paid their bill, or Patrick has because he _promised to pay, David, it was implied when I said dinner was included,_ they slip back into Patrick’s car. David digs his fingers into the handle screwed into the ceiling when the engine turns over a third time before finally starting up, but they make it home relatively without incident.

Patrick’s hand makes its way across the center console once the car is pointed toward the apartment, cruise control on and radio turned up. David squeezes it and lets it stay.

“Do you want to shower?” David asks once they’re up the stairs in Patrick’s apartment. Patrick opened this morning and had slid out of bed an hour early to get in a quick hike before he left. He doesn’t smell, which is impressive and speaks well to the deodorant they’re testing for Katherine, but Patrick hates working out without showering after.

But Patrick wrinkles his nose. “Why would I want that?”

“Your hike,” David says. “You hate when you haven’t washed off a hike. And it’s been an entire day.”

It takes Patrick a second to catch up; once he pieces David’s words together his eyes widen. “Right,” he says, voice pitched too high. “The hike I went on this morning. I, uh, didn’t go that far. Long. I didn’t hike too far, so I didn’t get too, um. Dirty.”

“Hm.” David nods and steps behind Patrick to help him out of his jacket. He keeps insisting that his slippery all-purpose puffer is good and that he doesn’t need David’s help picking out a new one, but it’s just this side of too tight. Patrick’s big hands always get tangled up in the sleeves on the way out.

Patrick kind of contorts on his way out of the jacket, pushing his left hip forward and sucking in his stomach so that the jacket is even harder to get off than usual.

“This isn’t helping,” David says halfway through, once Patrick’s shimmying has gotten him out of the right sleeve but not the left. “Can you just stop moving for a second? God, this coat.”

“Sorry sorry sorry,” Patrick says, cheeks red. Maybe he’s finally accepted that David’s been right all along. “I can—here.” He leaves his left hand stuck and moves for the closet, blocking David’s view with his body as he slides the coat off and onto a hanger.

“Why are you hanging your coat up in there?” David asks. He doesn’t usually wear a coat, preferring to leave the lines of his sweaters untouched and staying warm through layers, but Patrick still insists on hanging both of their winter jackets on the hooks by the door just in case he ever wins the argument with David about body temperature regulation.

“It’s...dry cleaning. I’m sending it out for dry cleaning.”

David frowns, opening his mouth to tell Patrick just how wrong that would be, but he’s cut off by his boyfriend pushing into his space and ushering him backward toward the bed. Patrick moves slowly, surely. One step at a time.

“Been thinking about you all day,” Patrick breathes against David’s lips. Early on, David worked hard to get Patrick talking in bed. His boyfriend stuck with moans and whimpers at the outset, burying his mouth in David’s neck and mumbling words David didn’t let himself admit that he wanted to hear. But he’s always been curious, so eventually he moved his shoulder away, or kept himself, ahem, otherwise occupied until the words poured out of Patrick’s cute little mouth. It’s filthy sometimes, a detailed list of exactly what he wants to do to David, how it’ll make him feel and what David should do in the meantime.

At the time, David did not know precisely how many emotions Patrick had been humming into his skin where David couldn’t parse them. He might have let it go on longer otherwise. It’s a feedback loop now; they’re too far down the path of Patrick moving on to talk about the flush overtaking David’s face and ears, the way he pulls in his lips and bites down, the way he hides his face in Patrick’s chest. David hates it.

“All day. David, you have no idea.” Patrick’s still going, because of course he is. He tugs David’s sweater over his head and folds it as well as he ever does—that is to say, not well—before setting it neatly on the floor and nudging David back another step. He gets a hand on David’s fly, and that’s just—of course David wants that. It’s just that he wants Patrick to get a tad more naked first, is all.

But Patrick twists around as David tries to get a few of his buttons loose. “Can you—can we get this shirt off please?” David does his best not to whine, but. Seriously.

“One minute, babe.”

David suddenly cares much less about how he sounds. That’s—he doesn’t want that. It makes him feel—it twists up something inside him and leaves him feeling exposed.

Patrick’s still watching his face, a faint smile lighting his face up because he knows, he has to know that David doesn’t—that he can’t do that. “Something the matter?”

David tips his head back in frustration. He can’t look at Patrick when he’s like this or he’ll do something horrifying like lean into the pet name accidentally and then he’ll be subjected to it for...the rest of the relationship. Babe isn’t the worst but it’s also not—it’s not going to work. For him. “Weren’t you in the middle of something, here?” he says instead of any of the other words clanging around his head. “Did you want to tease me or did you want to maybe get on with it?”

Patrick ducks his head like he hasn’t in a while when they’re mid- _this_ and mouths at the join of David’s shoulder and neck. It’s sensitive, especially when the scratchy material of Patrick’s shirt presses up against his bare chest, creating friction over his nipples that sparks up the column of his neck and makes him frazzled.

It’s insulting is what it is, that Patrick can lift his head after all that and look so thoroughly put together. “Aw,” Patrick runs a hand through David’s hair, further messing him up, and presses a soft kiss to his temple after, apology and flourish rolled into one. “It’s cute that you think I can’t multitask.”

“That’s not exactly what I—” David inhales as Patrick twines both hands into his hair and pulls him down toward the bed by the head.

“Hm?” David knows better than to think Patrick’s unaffected, but his tone is doing wonders at selling the idea. The way his breath catches when he tugs David into place over the sheets changes things, though. Patrick stays committed despite the audible tell. “What were you saying, David?”

David decides to let this happen. He stretches his legs long, then wraps them around Patrick’s waist. If he can just get Patrick down here with him, maybe to close his offensive eyes for a second, then they can get back on track. He lifts his hips, pressing his fly against the front of Patrick’s jeans for a second before Patrick tuts and wraps his hands around the jut of David’s hips on both sides and presses him down into the sheets. David wiggles, testing, but Patrick holds firm.

“Nuh uh,” Patrick breathes. “You’re gonna—stay right where I put you.”

David wiggles again, this time for a different reason. They’ve done this before; he knows what Patrick needs to hear to let him out, but he doesn’t think he’ll have to say it. He doesn’t think he’ll have to say anything.

Patrick squeezes, then pulls his hands away slowly. David stays in place—where Patrick put him—as Patrick’s hands undo his fly and tug the jeans down. He gets them over David’s feet and folds them quickly, dropping them onto the nightstand. David kicks off his socks and reaches for Patrick’s buttons again, but Patrick makes a gravelly noise low in his throat that goes straight to David’s dick and David’s hands drop back to the bed without Patrick lifting a finger.

“Aw,” Patrick says for the second time. It makes David feel—small, somehow. Patrick’s using every inch of his height and every ounce of his weight to huddle around David. He’s all David can see. “You keep trying to move, huh.” It’s not a question. He doesn’t need David to respond. “But you’re not going to. You’re going to let me.”

So David’s going to let him.

“Look at you,” Patrick murmurs then, leaning in close and kissing down David’s shoulder. He pulls away—motherfucker—and keeps talking. “So—you’re so beautiful, David.”

And this, this is the worst part of the words that David unknowingly set free, like the flying monkeys that went all over the place when they got away from the Wicked Witch except neither he nor Patrick look their best in green. He can’t stand these sentimental, incendiary, flying-monkey words. Especially not while Patrick’s fully clothed. “Can you _please_ take your clothes off,” he asks, except it’s too breathy to lilt up at the end like it's supposed to.

Patrick sticks out his lower lip, making fun of David’s pout. The pout only comes out when David's drunk, so it’s a horrible knowing deep cut. “It’s okay,” he says, flat and sure and in the same way he tells customers a bag is ten cents extra. “You know I’ll take care of,” he swallows, “It. Tonight. You just have to—”

“Go where you put me,” David finishes, then bites his lip. Too eager. Too much.

But Patrick nods and leans in to catch David’s mouth. He licks at the seam of David’s lips and takes over, one hand spreading across his cheek, urging him up into the kiss while he tangles his other hand in the hair at the center of David’s chest. He pulls back to keep fucking talking, though, which is. Well. David can’t help the noise he makes at that, the whimper that he bites back as soon as he realizes it’s audible.

“I know,” Patrick says sympathetically, except he can’t really be sorry because he tweaks David’s nipple as he says it, love leaking out of his eyes and getting all over everything as David squirms underneath him. “I know it’s hard for you. Which is why you have me.”

And he means it. David can tell because he says it without a pause between the words, without a moment for any of his neuroses to slip in between and latch onto.

The fucker keeps talking as his hand works lower, sliding into David’s boxer briefs and running lightly along the length of him before he pulls his hand away, bracing himself against the headboard and just _looking_ at David, god. “Can’t believe I found you,” he breathes. “Can’t believe how good you are.”

David hates the words Patrick’s lobbing at him. He hates that there’s nowhere to hide, nothing to distract Patrick with. He strains up as far as he can without technically moving his arms or his legs or his torso, trying to catch Patrick’s mouth before it runs away and does something they can’t come back from. But Patrick stays just out of reach, close enough that he can whisper to David but far enough that David can’t stop him.

“And you’re so good, David,” Patrick continues, the spark in his eye making it clear to David that he knows exactly what he’s doing. “You take such good care of me. Always so perfect for me, knowing what I want and helping me get it.”

That’s not right actually; David often makes things harder and misreads the signs. And David knows, okay, he knows that a therapist would have a fucking field day with these squiggly lines between what he’s comfortable with and what makes him cast about for an excuse or his mom’s brown bag or a made-up call from the Australian embassy about his sister.

Well. Not a _fucking_ field day. Even if he wasn’t in a committed relationship (Patrick’s words), he’s not going to go down the road he took with that one school counselor again because it creates ethical problems (the counselor’s words) and is really more trouble than it’s worth (a universal truth).

David’s a mess, is the point.

“Can I at least interest you in doing _something_ soon?” He’s pushing and he knows it, testing the safe landing Patrick’s promised him. “Because I might die if you don’t get your hands on me in the next thirty seconds, honey.”

Oh, fuck. That _honey_ is going to be his downfall. He’s been able to tamp it down most of the time, but when Patrick pulls him apart like this, shaking him out into component pieces, checking each of them against the bright light of his regard and then piecing him back together with the same care he arranges the bottles in the store—entirely to David’s specifications, with no comments about the correctness of the configuration—well. David can’t be blamed for letting a little more of his hand show.

Patrick’s eyebrow goes up. At least, David’s pretty sure it does. It’s dim in the room and his boyfriend’s little brows aren’t exactly distinctive, but his eyes widen and his forehead crinkles so it’s a safe assumption that the eyebrow is also moving. So he’s heard David then, which is. It’s certainly something.

Acknowledging what he’s said sounds terrible but slightly less mortifying than ignoring it. Especially because Patrick’s blinking at him now, slow and sweet. David can’t let that stand. “I didn’t mean—”

“Oh, I think you did, honey.” When Patrick looks up next, his eyes are bright, calculating. David tries not to squirm at the turning of the tables. “You think I don’t see what you do for me, but I do.”

“I don’t—”

“You _do._ ” Patrick stops then, eyes widening as he bites his lip, hard. He reaches a hand up to grab at David’s, fiddling with the silver ring on his pointer finger. The calluses always feel so good, reminding David who it is touching him all over. Patrick plays David like he plays other things, stroking his fingers down over David’s wrist and following after with a kiss. It’s not hot. David gets no special enjoyment from Patrick’s lips and hands on the thin skin inside his wrist. Still, it makes him shudder.

Patrick tilts his head. When he’s like this, he looks like a mathematician, adding up numbers and reactions only he can see and using the output to make David fly. He keeps watching David, eyes like a physical presence against David’s skin as he runs both hands down David’s sides. “Love you here,” he says softly. It’s not clear to David if Patrick means _here in this bed_ or _here where you’re insecure_ or neither or both, but he’s going to explode.

He’s pretty sure it’s both.

Patrick moves lower and slips David’s underwear over his thighs and down. The incongruity between them—Patrick fully dressed from the second-highest button of his blue shirt to the soles of his scratchy wool socks and David now laid bare under him—is hot and also terrifying. David has a feeling Patrick’s seeing way more than he wants.

Patrick trails kisses up from the skin in front of him—David’s knee, _where did this man come from_ —up over David’s hip, along his stomach and chest until he finally reaches David’s neck. He switches to licks and bites then, marking David up in obvious spots that he won’t be able to hide without help. He pulls back and smiles at the “ah, ah” noises David can’t bite back, then dives back in and leaves bubbly, silly kisses all over David’s face until he reaches the crease where David can feel his eyebrows furrowing.

“You’re so sweet for me,” Patrick says, then drops a kiss between David’s brows where he’s holding all of his reservations. “Just lean back and let me show you.”

“Show me what?” David manages, barely. His breath is coming in pants now, and his chest is heaving in a way that is really quite out of proportion with how slow Patrick is moving.

“How you—” Patrick leans his forehead against David’s and sighs. “I can’t get the words right.”

David has a couple of choices here. He can see them stretch out in front of him. Asking for more of this is awful, especially because he doesn’t need it. He isn’t even sure if he wants it, honestly. It’s vulnerable in a way he really only lets himself get around Patrick every so often and never in the daytime. Normally it happens by accident. So stepping deliberately into it, letting Patrick know he wants it...ugh. But the alternative of not having it is so much worse. “Your words are, um.” He swallows down all the jokes he could make. “They’re good. I like them.”

“So you like this, then,” Patrick says slowly. Any trace of insecurity has vanished; it’s gone so quickly that David almost forgets that it was there in the first place.

David waits for Patrick to get back into it all, but when he dares to meet Patrick’s eyes he’s just waiting. He taps a finger against David’s lower lip and smiles, all teeth.

Evil. He’s evil and mean and David doesn’t like him at all. “Seriously?”

Patrick nods, widening his eyes to sell the act. If this is the energy he’s bringing to _Cabaret_ , the show is doomed and the reputations of his mother and best friend will be ruined. “I need to hear it.”

“Then say it yourself,” David tries.

Patrick rolls his hips once. David would pretend to be unmoved, but every nerve ending on his body is lit up like a neon sign screaming _I love this_ so what does he have to lose, really.

“I really do.” David focuses on the corner where the ceiling meets the wall, where the paint is just starting to peel. Patrick’s going to need to call maintenance about that sooner rather than later.

“What’s that, David?”

“You’re a monster.”

Patrick presses lovely terrible kisses against the crown of David’s head, the tip of his nose, the curve of his cheek where he swears David has a dimple. “And?”

David rolls his eyes, shaking his head to let out some of the energy popping between them. “I love this.”

“Oh, you _love_ it,” Patrick gets a hand around his cock, slick with lube that he put on god-knows-when. “If you really love it, then I guess I should give it to you.”

David bites down on the words rushing through his mind. He’s said too much already.

“Look at you,” Patrick says, because he’s predictable. He only owns ten of his blue shirts, and he orders the same thing every time they go to Zoe’s diner, and he’s perfect. David wants to learn every single one of his routines. He wants to be part of the routine, wants to be a thing that Patrick does like clockwork.

Instead of saying that, he lifts his hips in a quest for friction. The rough material of Patrick’s jeans is somehow too much and not enough. Patrick hums sympathetically and kisses his cheek. It should be patronizing but instead it feels...delicate.

Patrick’s expert hand slips against David’s hole, one finger circling his rim and then finally pushing inside. David keens, pushing back for more.

Patrick doesn’t make him wait long, sliding another finger in in short order and stretching him out. A third finger follows, fast and thorough. It sends a zing up David’s spine and pulls him taut like a string when he finds David’s prostate.

“Now,” David says on an exhale.

“What’s that?” Impossible, he’s _impossible._

“Please. Patrick, please.”

“You’re perfect like this.” These short declarations are going to kill David, he’s going to die here and it’s going to be the worst article on Ray’s gossip blog, worse than even the one speculating about him and Stevie last year long after they had already broken up, and Patrick’s going to look so hot in black but David won’t get to see it.

Patrick rolls a condom on and coaxes David up so he can slide a pillow underneath him. He grabs David’s right hand and holds tight, fingers running up and down and over his rings and squeezing and rubbing his calluses everywhere. Then he uses his other hand to line up and push inside David, hips rolling at a glacial pace until David can’t stop himself from making an impatient noise and moving to meet him.

Patrick sets a fast pace then, and it’s embarrassing how fast David’s getting there. He should be embarrassed. Except Patrick’s shoulders keep shaking with hitched little breaths at David’s reactions, and his mouth keeps moving because apparently the pancakes earlier weren’t enough, he wants to give David even more sweet things.

David moves his hips down to meet Patrick thrust for thrust, getting into the rhythm and going where he’s pulled when Patrick tugs at his shoulders. He leans up to get a better angle just like Patrick wants and gasps when Patrick stops talking and attaches his mouth to David’s ear, hot breath spilling onto his sensitive neck.

“Baby,” Patrick whispers into his ear. “Honey.”

David cries out and snaps his hips forward once, twice, until it’s over for him. Patrick keeps sucking as David comes down but stops thrusting, sliding out of David in one smooth motion and running his hand through the mess David left on his stomach.

David drops his knees open and holds his hand out for the—“Lube, get the lube, honey,” and pours far too much on the insides of his thighs. Patrick shuffles up and gets with the program, fucking between David’s thighs and moaning into the skin of David’s shoulder. The vibrations of his pleasure ripple through David. It’s electric; Patrick is electric.

Patrick is finally spent, tired and talked out. He keeps kissing David, though. He scrabbles up the bed all elbows and knees, and then he kisses David’s mouth, slightly off-center. Then he rolls to David’s left and presses his front against David’s side, settling his head on David’s chest and kissing the skin in front of him. David wrinkles his nose and says they need to clean up, so naturally Patrick kisses his nose, unselfconscious and unbearably genuine. Then he says “fine, David,” and David has to take the initiative to kiss him, swallowing Patrick’s laughter as David runs a hand across his side lightly and pinches his hip.

Patrick kisses the back of his neck while he’s brushing his teeth, and then Patrick bumps his hip when he starts his skincare. And twenty minutes later, David slides under the covers of the bed and Patrick rolls closer.

“Goodnight, honey.” His voice is slow and quiet the way it gets just before he falls asleep, the way it is when he tells David about his hikes and the book he’s reading and the sweater he saw at a vendor’s house that reminded him of David.

David wrinkles his nose but lets it slide as the puffs of Patrick’s breath against his cheek even out.


End file.
